


blind dive

by dreadwyrmspawn (binarytonystark)



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Allagan Bullshit, Final Fantasy XIV: Stormblood, Gen, Headcanon, Making It Up As We Go Along Folks, Miqo'te (Final Fantasy XIV), Miqo'te Warrior of Light (Final Fantasy XIV), Patch 4.4: Prelude In Violet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-03
Updated: 2018-10-03
Packaged: 2019-07-24 18:57:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,369
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16181174
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/binarytonystark/pseuds/dreadwyrmspawn
Summary: The words are ghosts on Rua’s lips as he rounds the corner. In the background he can hear is sister call for him, but it’s faint. The unmistakable sheets of glowing metals opposing him, overpowering his attention.





	blind dive

**Author's Note:**

> I'm abusing the grey timeline, and twisting Tiamat's words.

  
“Oh—no,” the words are ghosts on Rua’s lips as he rounds the corner. In the background he can hear is sister call for him, but it’s faint. The unmistakable sheets of glowing metals opposing him, overpowering his attention. The technology still running, but how? The aether in The Burn is disturbed and unbalanced. He can hear the gears grinding from the drones in the distance. He needs to get a closer look, but can’t with them in the way.

“Fox, what’s—?” R’hiyo comes to an abrupt stop when she sees the blue reflecting on her brother’s face. 

“On the other side of the world,” Rua’a mutters to himself as his fingers twitch at his side. Ruby Carbuncle heeds the order to withdraw as he pulls his grimoire free. He did not expect to fight, least of all against Allagan machinations. With the party split in the storms, he and R’hiyo would need help—even with their combined skill.

Sephirot-egi is barely summoned when the drones swing, driving toward them at full speed.

“Hells!” R’hiyo yells as the dreadnaught swings its arm toward the pair, her aether shields splintering from the swipe.

Sephirot-egi sends an earthshaking rip through the room, the bugs falling without a fight. Rua’a grits his teeth, the aether in the room flowing through him is full of pain. He releases it in a flare and he can feel Bahamut inside him beginning to stir. 

< Summon me, Warrior. >

_They’re not happy to see Sephirot—what makes you think they’ll be pleased to see you?_

< There will be naught left of them to fear. >

_My point, exactly. I would like a closer look at these ruins._

A pillar twists from the earth below, piercing straight through the dreadnaught’s core disabling it in a single blow.

R’hiyo holds her hand out toward Rua’a, Lily’s magicks transfering to him and quelling the aether that swirls in his soul. Sephirot-egi withdraws soon after, replaced with Ruby Carbuncle once more.

“They sensed us.”

Rua’a shakes his head as he steps into the room, “They sensed Sephirot’s aetheric signature.” He spreads his hand out against one of the solid metal walls, feeling the machinery whir away behind them. “We need to find a terminal.”

They pass through a tunnel into another room, laying waste to some coblyns and more machinery—with Titan-egi’s assistance this time. Bahamut claws just below the surface, the trances fogging Rua’a’s thoughts as he passes into the next chamber.

< Light Bringer, listen! >

Rua’a thrashes his head side to side, “No!” he cries out, clutching at the crystal that hangs from his neck. R’hiyo offers a reassuring touch, grounding him back towards reality. She hides her worry well.

“Fox, let’s keep moving. We should find the way out of here.” Her suggestion dies on deaf ears. The opportunity to uncover more of Allag’s secrets too tempting.

Rua’a straightens himself, looking around the room to find an access panel on the far wall. The terminal boots up. Reliable technology. Rua’a is half waiting for it to mention something about not being serviced for two millennia.

“Subject confirmed: Rua’a Yuuki.” the monitor intones and Rua’a nearly launches himself out of his boots. His attention turns back to the monitor, his heart hammering in his chest. The feed runs through his fights against Lahabrea, and later the three fiends on Azys Lla. More more recently his time spent on the floating island with Y’mhitra. 

Curiously R’hiyo reaches for the screen.

“Error: Subject Not Found.”

R’hiyo frowns, “not fair, I’ve seen inside the Crystal Tower.”

“You’ve never been to Azys Lla.” 

< Light Bringer. >

Rua’a swallows against the lump that begins to form in this throat. “I think, perhaps.” He wanders toward the far end of the room to move further down the ruins. The dreadwyrm aether shoots pains through his core, causing him to stumble. 

“Fox!”

“I’m fine,” he shakes his hand to stop her advance. Bahamut is calling so close now. Not the primal that had consumed him since Azys Lla. No, this was far more powerful. Rivaling that of Midgardsormr. Was the elder dragon still churning in the aetherial sea; why did he call out now?

< Light Bringer. Listen. I do not wish to cause you harm. >

_What’s going on here. . ._

< You have figured it out, just admit it. >  


The aether surges inside him, deep within the heart of the planet it pulls from. Rua’a lets out a cry as the dreadwyrm’s trances wash his soul clean. The sea of blue he feels trapped in, drowning. His vision blacks out as he sinks, dying. Dead. He collapses against something firm and real at the sea floor. Then. Then he’s flying. The wind rushing against his face. His heart pounding in his ears as he breathes his first new breath.

He opens his eyes to find R’hiyo hovering over him. His body lying stretched out on the cold steel floor. Her eyes welling with tears she struggles to hold back. Her codex falling to the floor with a muted thud. A resurrection spell scrawled across the open pages.

A shaky sigh breaks over her lips as his name tumbles loose. She reaches out to push his bangs from his eyes.

“That was not a normal Trance.”

With slow movements Rua’a pushes himself to a sitting position. “It was Bahamut.”

“Aren’t they all?”

Rua’a shakes his head as he stands with his sister’s assistance. His soul is turbulent, the dragon’s force not wanting to wait any longer. He opens his grimoire, the book hovering in front of him as he summons the elder primal.

< Light Bringer. I see now there are two of you. >

R’hiyo’s eyes widen as she hears the elder dragon invade her thoughts. She may not be bound to the primals as Rua’a is, but she can still tell this is not the same. The aether around them is calm, and neither Lily or Ruby are alert to the dawn dragon before them.

“Bahamut, how?”

Rua’a turns to face the dragon behind him, “I collapsed because I was pulled into the aetherial sea by him.”

“You’ve gone insane!” R’hiyo accused him, his eyes still wide, “Thousands of years, his soul cannot still be intact.”

< Our aether is not of this star, Little One. Hydaelyn appreciates the power, but it does not assimilate well in the sea. >

“Then Ratatoskr and Nidhogg are—”

“They were consumed, the entirety of their aether will never return to the sea,” Rua’a said plainly. The unfamiliar words leaving more questions than answers in his own mind.

“Why are you here? How are you here?”

< The Light Bringer’s true strength is immeasurable. As for why, the Light Bringer already knows. >

Bahamut leaves the pair, flying toward the exit back to the surface. R’hiyo turns to her brother, still not quite believing what she had witnessed.

“Ok, humor me,” she says as she folds her arms across her chest, “why.”

“I think Azys Lla was torn from the earth here,” he confesses as he moves toward the exit, Ruby following at his heels. R’hiyo isn’t far off, the questions still tumbling from her.

“And a connection still exists between the two places? That’s why the terminal recognized you.”

“I think so. And the drones recognized Sephirot’s signature. Bahamut confirmed my suspicions about this place.”

They turn the corner together the bright white expanse blinding them. The sun shining overhead, with white sands below. There was no life as far as they could see. Craters and allagan domes littered the wide expanse. A floating kingdom to save an empire from the pending calamity. The pair joins Bahamut at the top of the cliff looking down below. The dawn dragon silent as he stares out to see a place that had not seen change in millennia. 

“I spoke with Tiamat on Azys Lla. She said they took her from you. I always thought that meant you died on Mercydia. But I’m beginning to believe I mistook her words.”

< Correct. My love, and our brood were stolen away to this place. >

Rua’a could feel the anger and sadness well inside him, amplified through the trance’s tether to Bahamut. The anguish crushed his chest, breathing became labored.

“This is where you died.”

**Author's Note:**

> OC profiles: [Rua'a Yuuki](http://nebzula.tumblr.com/ruaabio) && [R'hiyo Yuuki](http://nebzula.tumblr.com/rhiyobio)


End file.
